FIFA

The 2014 World Cup is shaping up to be a goal fest, with an average of 3 goals per game so far (20 out of 64 matches played). You would have to go back to 1958 to find an average of 3 goals or more per game. Who are the players scoring all of these dazzling goals? Most are migrants. A goal scorer is deemed to be a migrant if he is thought to be living in a country outside his country of birth, as indicated by playing for a club outside his country of birth. This is regardless of whether the national team being represented is the same as the country of birth.

In order to highlight the contributions of migrants, we will keep a running tally of goals scored by migrants and non-migrants in the chart below. The more detailed file is available here. Check back and see how they are doing as this exciting World Cup reaches its climax!

The World Cup Football finals get underway in Brazil today – the long wait is over! They mean many different things to the billions around the world who will come together to watch, evoking intense emotions of national pride and glory, or humiliation and outrage. Goals and calls by referees are recalled decades later, hotly debated in a passion for the ‘beautiful game.’ One key aspect of this ultimate expression of globalization is that most of the players are migrants, either playing for their national teams while currently residing in another country (such as Lionel Messi, born in Argentina, living in Spain, and playing for Argentina), or playing for a national team different from their country of birth (such as Diego Costa, born in Brazil, living in Spain, and playing for Spain), or both (such as Miroslav Klose, born in Poland, living in Italy, and playing for Germany).